The Foolproof Way to Learn How Your Significant Other Really Feels

If you've ever fought to keep your voice natural-sounding when you're bringing up a relationship issue or added a little false cheer to a conversation with the in-laws, you know that changing the voice's emotional tone is something we do every day. But new research suggests something surprising: For the most part, you don't control your own voice to meet a specific goal (e.g., to sound less nervous or hide that you're upset); rather, you listen to your own voice to learn how you're feeling. In the study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), researchers played around with participants' voices. "Very little is known about the mechanisms behind the production of vocal emotion," lead author Jean-Julien Aucouturier from the French National Centre for Scientific Research in France said in a statement. "Previous research has suggested that people try to manage and control their emotions, for example hold back an expression or reappraise feelings. We wanted to investigate what kind of awareness people have of their own emotional expressions." Aucouturier and her colleagues had study subjects read a story aloud and hear their voice through headphones. What they didn't tell them: Experimenters were altering their voices

If you've ever fought to keep your voice natural-sounding when you're bringing up a relationship issue or added a little false cheer to a conversation with the in-laws, you know that changing the voice's emotional tone is something we do every day. But new research suggests something surprising: For the most part, you don't control your own voice to meet a specific goal (e.g., to sound less nervous or hide that you're upset); rather, you listen to your own voice to learn how you're feeling.

In the study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), researchers played around with participants' voices. "Very little is known about the mechanisms behind the production of vocal emotion," lead author Jean-Julien Aucouturier from the French National Centre for Scientific Research in France said in a statement. "Previous research has suggested that people try to manage and control their emotions, for example hold back an expression or reappraise feelings. We wanted to investigate what kind of awareness people have of their own emotional expressions."

Aucouturier and her colleagues had study subjects read a story aloud and hear their voice through headphones. What they didn't tell them: Experimenters were altering their voices to sound just a little more happy, sad, or fearful than they actually were. Subjects, it turned out, changed their mood to match whatever mood they picked up in their voices. Like, Oh, my voice sounds bummed? Then I must be down in the dumps. Noted.

"The relationship between the expression and experience of emotions has been a long-standing topic of disagreement in the field of psychology," Petter Johansson, a co-author from Lund University in Sweden, added. "This is the first evidence of direct feedback effects on emotional experience in the auditory domain."

Researchers think there might be therapeutic applications, like lifting people's moods by making them think their voices are quivering with cheer. (Katsumi Watanabi, a coauthor from Japan, also noted in a statement that the technology could boost the emotional impact of a karaoke performance. Boom.)

We like to think there's a nice takeaway for daters everywhere too: The truth is always in the timbre. That means if your date sounds a little moony when he talks about his ex, or your boyfriend's voice gets strained whenever you talk about moving in together, take note—that's a dead giveaway.

As for you: With all due respect to Roxette, when it comes to sorting out your own feelings, screw "listen to your heart"—listen to your voice. There's nothing else you can do-ooo...